This weekend’s slate of concerts happening around the Valley includes a few significant gig. There’s the final show at Trunk Space’s current home, of course, as well as performances by such esteemed and ground-breaking artists as surf king Dick Dale, the legendary avant-garde musicians of Negativland, and rock icon Todd…
John Nommensen Duchac has walked many miles in the shoes of his fabled rock ’n’ roll persona. He is John Doe, who is not too unlike your everyday… well, John Doe. He is the neighbor at the end of the street, who is making an honest living, minds his own…
Kanye West has a long and very public history of making rash statements and failing to think through the consequences, but this might take the cake. “My album will never never never be on Apple,” West tweeted the day after the release of The Life of Pablo. “And it will never…
When I was much younger, lyrics were supreme. Nothing else mattered as much as what the singer was trying to express via libretto. It was only after years of reviewing music and hearing the same sentiment over and over — the voice is just an instrument — that I finally…
Attention residents of Chandler: despite what you might have seen on Facebook recently, Slim Shady probably won’t be moving into your hood anytime soon. And if you’ve heard or read otherwise, it’s safe to say you’ve been bamboozled by an Internet hoax. Last week, a story from the website Dailynews11.com…
A local rapper and hip-hop impresario is currently in critical condition at a local hospital after being struck by a motorcyclist early this morning in Tempe. Robert Evers, better known by his stage name Bob Domestic, was severely injured when an unknown motorcycle rider hit the performer while he was…
For all the goth-related hype that once surrounded his beloved first band, Bauhaus, and for all of the vocal/artistic parallels made with the late David Bowie, Peter Murphy has always been able to rely on being a voice of originality without artifice. Oh sure, there are moments where the man…
McDowell Mountain Music Festival announced its dates for next year’s festival yesterday. The three-day music festival, which brings major headliners to downtown Phoenix, will take place March 3-5, 2017. Last year’s festival saw Beck and Avett Brothers play. The previous year, Widespread Panic and others came down for the festivities…
Sadie Switchblade of Girls Living Outside Society’s Shit (G.L.O.S.S.) had a pretty simple answer when she was asked why she chose to call her new solo garage rock side project “Dyke Drama.” “It’s pretty straightforward. I’m gay, and the first batch of songs were just like, really personal lesbian love…
As we predicted last month in the best monthly metal shows, those crazy April metal showers clearly yield May metal — 13 to be exact, aligning perfectly with those Friday the 13th shows as well. And this month’s list of killer shows, combined with the crazy cool weather we’ve been…
The Evangelical Covenant Church (ECC) received a video invitation from Phoenix native and legendary shock rocker Alice Cooper. Cooper isn’t bringing ECC leadership to one of his shows or to see him in the studio of his radio program Nights With Alice Cooper. He is inviting attendees at Gather ’16,…
Look, we know it’s coming and so do you. And truth be told, there’s nothing that any of us can do to stop it. Summer is just around the corner, its probably going to be as miserable as ever, and the only thing you can do is make sure your…
No doubt about it, we suffered two devastating music legend losses in April 2016, but it is heartwarming to know that alarmist podcasts like Infowars and websites Survivopedia.com have found the missing link between Merle Haggard and Prince and united them in death — yes, those geo-engineering chemtrails! “Just to…
Few bands have had the power to unify youth the way the Violent Femmes did in the early- and mid-1980s. The band, which stops by Marquee Theatre in Tempe on Tuesday, March 3, had an extraordinary ability to unify the various cliques found in American high schools and colleges. Putting…
When thousands of party fiends, electronic dance music fans, and members of the young-and-beautiful crowd invaded Big Surf this past weekend for Wet Electric, they came dressed for the occasion. After all, the annual EDM festival also serves as the largest pool party in Arizona, which meant that practically everyone…
It’s not exactly something that’s touted in ads for Sauza and Patron, but did you know tequila is really good for you? True story. Depending on who you ask, the spirituous substance hewn from the agave plants of Mexico can not only work as a sleep aid, but can also…
The year is 1983. Punk is dead, and the undead appears to be on the minds of many post-punk ingénues and avant-garde crowds alike. Nowhere did the dark light shine more forebodingly than in Tony Scott’s campy erotic horror cult film The Hunger, which starred David Bowie and Catherine Deneuve…
Just as the phone conversation between myself and Stephen McBean, leader of the Vancouver, British Columbia band Black Mountain, is warming up, it gets cut short. The quintet’s van is being pulled over by California Highway Patrol. He calls me back 20 minutes later and assures me everything is okay…
From hazy mirages to towering surrealistic succulents to billowing heatwaves, the desert screams psychedelia—and Phoenix, The Valley of the Spun, is no exception. For as long as there have been musicians in this area, many have turned to altered states for inspiration in their music. Here’s a list of some…
The recent hiring of Joseph Specter as Arizona Opera’s new general director isn’t the first time in this last year that Phoenix and Austin have shared organizational arts leaders. Last December, the former director of the Scottsdale Center for the Performing Arts, Cory Baker, began a VP role at Austin’s…
Paper Foxes – “Indica Feels” For the first time in my recollection, three local bands have come together to put out a three-way split single in anticipation of an upcoming tour together. Paper Foxes is releasing their first song in the year since the release of their debut EP Love…
Remember that big Rihanna show that was supposed to happen back in March (but wound up getting rescheduled due to RiRi’s bout with bronchitis)? It’s finally going off this weekend. The R&B/pop star is bringing her ANTI tour to Talking Stick Resort Arena on Sunday, and according to everything we’ve…
